Question of the Day

Did illegal voters swing any congressional races?

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSEFormer President Jimmy Carter's Nobel Peace Prize award coincides with the 20th anniversary of the nonprofit Carter Center that bears his name.Under the slogan "Waging Peace, Fighting Disease, Building Hope," the Atlanta-based center has carried out missions around the globe, concentrating on human rights and democracy, resolving conflicts and becoming involved in health-oriented aid projects.Set in a 37-acre park on a hill overlooking the Georgia state capital, the center works closely with Emory University to send observers to monitor elections, bring warring factions to the negotiating table and generally promote democracy and economic cooperation.The complex, which boasts four pavilions with conference facilities, is also home to the Jimmy Carter Library and Museum, which houses the presidential papers of the Carter administration, run by the National Archives.Over the years, some 80 countries, notably in Africa, Asia and Latin America, have benefited from the center's work.Outlining its guiding principles, the center claims that it "emphasizes action and results" while remaining "nonpartisan" as it "addresses difficult problems and recognizes the possibilities of failure as an acceptable risk."Above all, it says: "The center does not duplicate the effective efforts of others."Taking the view that free and fair democratic elections are often the first step on the road to salvation for many developing countries, the center set up a Democracy Program in 1997, and has dispatched election monitors to countries as diverse as East Timor, Haiti, Panama, Ghana, Zambia, Nicaragua, Mexico, Venezuela and Mozambique, as well as across the Middle East.Through its International Human Rights Council, it also has been involved in monitoring human rights and helping to resolve conflicts in Sudan, Bosnia, Liberia, Ethiopia and the Korean Peninsula through mediation and international cooperation.The center also sees as a priority the eradication of tropical diseases and health education.The Carter Center, with a full-time staff of 150, led since 1992 by John Hardman, has an annual budget of about $27 million, coming largely from private donations, and it now can add to that fund the Nobel Prize committee's million-dollar contribution.